Feeling sort of guilty for my off day yesterday, I decided to make it up with a ten miler around the neighborhood today. Despite the amount of lingering snow and ice, temps in the low 30s felt almost hot with a long sleeve t-shirt and tights today (Yes I wore the dirty 50K tights from sat if you were wondering). I first tried to brave the fresh snow on the Rock Island trail but it felt hard even at a 10 min pace so I turned after about half a mile into the neighborhood where the HOA has nicely plowed most of the paths. Took the path up hill and started a couple of half mile or so intervals after the first couple miles. First one felt good and got down to low seven min range. Second one was uphill and was once again in the low sevens but towards the end my right IT band got tight which I haven't felt a twinge in since I started training by the Maffetone Method vs. going so hard every day. At that point, I decided I didn't want to overstress the body so I just ran. Even though it was slightly averaging uphill, I dropped back to around an 8 min pace after cooling down from the interval for the next few miles. At just over 7 miles, I picked it up again and ran in the low sevens downhill for another quarter mile until I hit an Unplowed section of path. With about 2 miles to go, I made one last half mileish push and was in the 6:45 to 6:50 range and feeling good and sustainable about it. After that I cooled down to the finish at just over ten miles and no twinges anywhere. The cost of the extra time running, I lost in sleep and only had time for seven hours today so that I could get up and have dinner with the fam.
Funny that even though I am running with a "plan" now for my self coaching, I am still running like I don't have one. Before, I kept a general idea of what I wanted to do each week and recently got more organized. Fun part of a plan is I still like to be more flexible and listen to my body. Let it rip when it is time and take it easy or rest when it is time for that which appears to waver day to day or even during a single workout. The body has to be in the right state to get done what you need to do. All in all, last year I was in great aerobic shape and still kept my anaerobic speed up so even though I dropped volume almost completely after the first week of Feb, I was able to rock a decent time at Salida because the very few runs I did do were at a seven min pace which I wouldn't even dream of doing right now. That said, my aerobic ability is gaining quickly and I am beginning to really feel the fitness. I am very close to where I was aerobically last year so remaining solid, I think I have a great chance at beating my Salida time as long as there isn't crazy snow or ice there which is possible. I can guarantee that my avg HR will be lower there one way or the other. Last year I remember running up some of the hills and telling myself to try and keep my HR below 185 even at what felt like what should be a med effort. I bet same effort this year I will be more at low 160s but I guess we will see. That said, I gotta keep working in some speed work so I can try and sustain some good speed on the downs late in the race. I think just being in better maintained shape, my endurance alone will allow me a faster second half this year even if the first half is the same. Anyhow. Enough rambling. Less talk and more work gets the job done. I am planning another ten miles tomorrow morning and a 2 hour bike spin in the evening so it should be a solid day.
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